Improvement in compound explosive shells



` UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.A

HENRY BARTON, OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

IMPROVEMENT-IN COMPOUND ExPLosIvI-z `sHlaLLs Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 48.642, dated July 11, 1865.

construction and arran geiii'en t of separa te magv azines in sections, each section having a fusepipe. Y

The object ot' my invention is to produce a bursting force from the center of the shell, so as to scatter the outside shell in everydirection, while the sectional "magazines are thrown in every direction and explode separately after the first explosion.V

Figure 1 represents a section al view off the shell Fig. 2, an end view, showing the center magazine and the sectional magazines; 'Fig'.

3, a view of a sectional magazine, and Fig. 4'

an end viewof the same.

A'represents the outside shell, pointed in front, and having a screw-butt, B, with a cavity, C, and an oiset, D, in which the leaden ring E 'its to prevent the ning sliding off, to ll the bore of the gun, give force to thef shell, and form a flange to give accuracy to its direction by rotary Inotion. The front of the shell has a tubular way, G, through its center, in which a hammer-rod is inserted to operate on a cap on the nipple H ot the circular plate 1.

The cavity C is an -air-chamber that is intended to assist the scattering of the yfragments of the outside shell.

` The sectional magazines J 'are formed of eight (more or less) movable quarter-sections, that are separate metal chests or shells, made of brass or any kind of metal, of suicient thickness and strength to sustain the first explosion from the center magazine, K, and each section J is filled with powder, is a separate magazine, and is ignitedbyafuse extending through each fuse-pipe L to the center magazine, K. These .sections J lit closely at their sides, surround the center magazine, K, and till the main shell A, and when the main or center magazine, K, explodes and the bursting charge communicates' its tire to the fuses of the'pipes L the mainfshell A is burst in every direction, and.

afterward each sectional magazine J bursts, explodes, and scatters its shell in all directions. l am `.aware that sphericaland elongated shells have been made with separate chambers, but when tested each and every chamber has been burst at the same instant lof time with the explosion of center magazines; but such permanent chambers I do not claim. -Therefore What lclaim as my invention, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is

- The construction and arrangement ot' the independent chambers J within an external shell, A, so as to form a central chamber or magazine, K, communicating with e'ach fusepipe L, as herein described, and for' the purposes set forth.

J. FRANKLIN REIGAR'I, J ORN S. HOLLINGSHEAD. 

